28 July 2015

Easy come, easy go

Britain’s blue-chip stocks have lost all the ground made this year after a five-day rout capped by a catastrophic collapse in Chinese shares yesterday.

The FTSE 100 has slumped almost 10 per cent from its record high in April of 7,103.98 and is now 1 per cent below where it opened the year. The slide gathered speed in the past week, with a fall of almost 5 per cent in a five-day stretch that marked its longest losing streak this year.

A collapse in Chinese equities overnight set the tone as markets across the world turned red. The Shanghai Composite tumbled 8.5 per cent, its steepest daily decline since February 2007, despite Beijing’s support measures. The CSI300 index of top shares in Shanghai and Shenzhen fell by 8.6 per cent.

And Chinese stocks continued their decline overnight. And the prospects for the FTSE today are less than promising.